by Pirateaba
Every now and then he failed, and would appear on Ksmvr’s lap. The Antinium watched as this happened now. Pisces yelped, popped out of existence on his side of the wagon, and appeared a little bit above Ksmvr. In the ensuing tangle, Pisces fought his way clear.
“Dead gods—give me that!”
He snatched the stone back from the Antinium and placed it on his side of the wagon. A bit of snow flew from the front and hit him on the head.
“Stop doing that! You’re scaring the horses!”
“Shall I reanimate them for you? I’m sure undead horses would be a lot faster than these slow nags.”
Pisces smiled nastily. His reply came in another bit of snow which struck him on the shoulder. Grumbling, Pisces went back to the door.
After a few moments, Ksmvr nodded and spoke up.
“We could make a shield out of it. I could hold it up with comrade Yvlon when fighting spellcasters.”
The young man’s head rose and he stared at Ksmvr.
“Really? That’s your idea?”
Ksmvr nodded, appreciating Pisces’ enthusiasm.
“A shield seems to be the most appropriate use of the door. We could make a harness so Comrade Yvlon could use it in place of her armor. It would protect her back so she would have no need of armor. If an enemy attacked all she would have to do would be to turn around.”
The Antinium paused, waiting for feedback. Pisces just stared at him. After a moment, he cleared his throat.
“I should like to see that. But I believe using the door as any form of personal armament should be employed only as a matter of last resort. Even if you were to block a spell with this door, [Fireball], for instance, the explosion would still affect those hiding behind the door. Any neophyte mage could easily burn you with a low-Tier flame spell were you to use it as cover.”
“Oh. I see.”
Ksmvr felt disappointed. Seeing this, Pisces felt moved to offer him a bone.
“The true value in the door might not be in its pratical use at all, but rather as a tool of study for me. I can learn a lot from the enchantments woven into it.”
The Antinium perked up. What helped Pisces was a boon for The Horns of Hammerad.
“Really? Can you copy the spells on the door?”
“Copy?”
Pisces coughed, and then laughed. He shook his head.
“That is far beyond my capabilities.”
“Why? Is it not simply a matter of reproducing the spell? That should be doable with time, should it not?”
“Yeah, [Mage]. What’s wrong? Is it too complex for you?”
Pisces ignored that comment from the front. Sniffing archly, he sat back. He took on the tone Ksmvr had associated with a lecture as he spoke out loud.
“The issue, Ksmvr, is that the nature of magic is not so linear as the philistines might have you think.”
“Hah!”
Again, Pisces ignored the wagon driver’s comment. Ksmvr nodded at him encouragingly. Magic was fascinating to him.
“Indeed?”
“Oh yes. You see, if this door—or should I say, this impressively enchanted self-activating portal device—were simply one enchantment, I dare say even Springwalker would be able to ascertain its nature quite quickly. But it is clearly not one enchantment. And the true exponential difficulty of a spell occurs when multiple layers exist.”
Ksmvr considered Pisces’ explanation and nodded.
“I see. So multiple spells cast on the same object increase the difficulty of analyzing and copying it?”
Pisces deflated somewhat at the Antinium’s calm response.
“…Yes.”
He turned back to the door, frowning at it.
“If it were just something like reinforcement, well, I could do that to a piece of wood, although not with the finesse or force of a true [Enchanter]. They could turn a piece of parchment into something as strong as steel…but as I’ve said magic changes when you layer another spell on top. It truly is quite incredible how many spells are worked into this wood.”
“That is why mages study so continuously?”
“To master the nuance of each spell and understand how magic can change, broadly speaking, yes. Even memorizing spells takes time, and comprehending concepts like spatial travel, well…”
“Can you [Teleport]?”
Pisces ignored that question. He gestured grandly at the door sitting on the back of the wagon.
“This wonder of magical engineering is clearly the work of a master [Mage]. Perhaps even an [Archmage]? Ah, probably not.”
He coughed.
“But studying it will surely raise my level, and it will be a far greater challenge than simply reading from a book of spells. When Springwalker sees this…”
“So you cannot copy the spell?”
Pisces paused, but then he nodded with a rueful smile.
“I wouldn’t even dare try. The spells are so tangled up that reproduction is impossible. I’d have to unravel each layer of spells and if that didn’t destroy the entire weaving…no, no, I only intend to study what parts are visible.”
He sighed, losing some of his posturing. Ksmvr nodded.
“I see. Are there some parts which are easier?”
Pisces shrugged, irritated by his moment of genuine expression. He scowled as he bent back over the door, poking at the brass handle.
“The entire thing is a mess. Let me concentrate. It’s hard enough to sit on this bumpy wagon—”
“Watch it, [Mage].”
The wagon driver snapped back at Pisces. He made a face. Ksmvr sat forwards too. The door was just plain, solid wood of course, but now he was very invested in Pisces’ discoveries.
“Surely there are some aspects which are simplest to understand. The triggering mechanism for the spell was analyzing it, was it not?”
“Relatively simple, yes. Of course the part of the spell that detects people investigating it is fiendishly complex. But the trigger component I identified straight off.”
Pisces dismissed that with a wave of the hand. Ksmvr nodded eagerly.
“In that case, would it not be easiest to focus on that part of the spell, knowing the method to activation and outcome?”
In his multi-faceted eyes, the Antinium saw the young man pause. Pisces stared at Ksmvr, and then down at the door. He cleared his throat.
“Uh. Yes. That would be…well, it’s a good place to start as any, I suppose.”
“It is a shame you cannot reverse the effect. That would have been very convenient in the pit.”
Ksmvr meant this only as a segue into asking whether Pisces could teleport him a few times, just so Ksmvr could see what it was like when he wasn’t about to die. But Pisces’ face froze and after a second he burst into a huge and uncharacteristic grin.
Somewhat unnerved, Ksmvr paused as Pisces turned to him. The [Mage] gingerly clapped a hand on Ksmvr’s shoulder. The Antinium stared at the hand. After a moment Pisces let go.
“You, Ksmvr, are clearly a natural-born scholar, as perhaps befits your advanced standing among the Antinium.”
“Thank you.”
“Reversing the spell. What a novel idea! And of course the actual binding spell on the stone is ludicrously simple compared to the door. Why, it wouldn’t be hard to reverse—that is to say, to create a trigger to activate the teleportation spell and bring whomever was there to the door! In fact…”
“Does this mean you can teleport me?”
“More than that, my dear Ksmvr. If this means what I think it does—here…you hold this and I shall…”
The Antinium and Human excitedly rocked back and forth on the wagon, jabbering on about ‘possible sequential instances of anchorage’ and ‘activation mechanisms’ and so on. At the head of the wagon, the Adelynn tried not to listen. After a while, she tried to plug her ears with both fingers, but it was hard to do that and guide the wagon. She sighed.
—-
“You’re late.”
Ceria scowl
ed at Pisces as he and Ksmvr lugged the door over to the front of the Frenzied Hare. The two had attracted quite a lot of attention as they’d dragged and carried it down the street. Now Ksmvr laid the door against the wall of the inn as Pisces panted for breath.
“Don’t blame me. If I could have conjured a few undead we wouldn’t have taken so long! Why no one appreciates the untapped potential of such labor—”
“Yes, yes.”
Ceria sighed, but she stared at the door, mildly impressed Pisces had managed to support his end of it. It was as heavy as it looked, she knew, and it looked heavy.
“Is that the door? The magic door?”
Erin stared dubiously at the heavy wood door. It looked as plain as plain could be. She wondered if Pisces and Ceria were playing a prank on everyone else, but Yvlon nodded.
“That’s the door. It doesn’t look like much but—if you could make armor out of it I’d wear it. I saw it take damage that would have shredded my plate armor.”
“Wow.”
No matter how hard Erin stared at it, she just couldn’t see it. But Pisces was clearly excited by the door. He waved his hands at Ceria, talking quickly.
“You won’t believe what I—and Ksmvr I suppose—have discovered! It’s a revolutionary—nay, unprecedented loophole in the spell matrix! I can’t believe it wasn’t covered!”
“Oh yeah? What’s so incredible?”
Ceria looked skeptical. Pisces pointed to the door, grinning broadly, one of the few times Erin had ever seen him happy.
“I managed to isolate the location aspect of the spell. Not only that—I figured out how to trigger it independently of the detection trap.”
Erin’s head swiveled with Yvlon’s towards Ceria. The half-Elf gasped.
“You don’t mean—seriously? And you did it on the ride back? Impossible!”
“Not.”
Pisces was smug. He gestured to the door.
“It all came down to a loophole. If you look around the doorknob—perhaps they didn’t have an adept mastery of enchantments? Or maybe the handle was added too late—either way I forced my way into the bindings from there and…”
He began talking gibberish, or perhaps Erin’s ears just shut down. She gathered that something important had happened by the way Ceria was reacting, but she couldn’t figure out what.
“Are we going to go?”
They had the wagon all ready, and a somewhat surly wagon driver ready to take them to Liscor. Ceria had said they’d be leaving soon. Yvlon shrugged, looking resigned.
“Mages. Give them a minute and then we’ll interrupt.”
Erin nodded. She looked around and frowned.
“Hey, where’s Ksmvr?”
The Antinium was nowhere to be seen. He hadn’t gone inside—had he run off? Erin wanted to ask Pisces—she didn’t want to go have to find Ksmvr as well!—when she heard a pop. Ksmvr appeared in front of the door, holding a small stone in his hands.
Yvlon gasped. Erin jumped and people on the street shouted in surprise. Ksmvr looked around proudly and Pisces broke off from chattering with Ceria to point at him gleefully.
“There, you see?”
“You can teleport to the door?”
“Yes!”
In an instant Erin was next to Ksmvr. She stared down at the stone in his hands and then at Pisces.
“How? Where? What?”
“It’s very simple. Actually, it’s not, but I’ll give you a simple explanation. The long and short of it is that we can take advantage of the door’s teleportation spell to teleport to the anchoring stone connected to it—or vice versa.”
Erin pointed at the stone in Ksmvr’s hands.
“You can teleport to that? And teleport back?”
“That’s what I said.”
“How many times?”
Yvlon’s eyes were wide with amazement. Pisces stroked at his chin, shrugging, speaking out loud.
“Any number of times. In time of course the enchantment will lose magic—it requires a huge amount to activate. But here’s the wonderful part—the magic will replenish itself over time!”
“Really?”
Erin was so excited her heart was beating out of her chest. Pisces nodded proudly.
“Quite extraordinary, really. It absorbs the natural mana in the environment—like any acceptably constructed artifact, I suppose—but it allows for practically unlimited uses of the teleportation magic!”
“This is incredible. That changes everything. This thing is—it’s actually useful.”
Ceria murmured as Ksmvr tried to keep people from crowding around the door. She tapped at the wood.
“How much could we sell it for? If you think of it as—as a way to travel, you could get from one end of the city to the other in seconds! Any [Lord] would want it, if only as a novelty.”
“A bit plain for a [Lord]’s door.”
Yvlon put that in, although she looked no less impressed. She ran a hand over the wood surface.
“But paint it and—could we get a hundred gold coins for it, do you suppose?”
“Hundreds? Try thousands. As I was saying, this is incredible! But we need not sell it yet—just imagine the utility of it in a dungeon! We could retreat at any time.”
Pisces was talking faster as he waved his arms about. Ksmvr was proudly showing the stone to people and resisting all attempts of people trying to take it from him. Erin stared down at the door, and an idea seized in her mind. She looked up and spoke loudly.
“I want it.”
Everyone stopped talking. The Horns of Hammerad stared at her. Erin stared back. She pointed at the door.
“I want it. Can I have it?”
“What?”
Pisces was the first to speak. He looked incredulous.
“This door is—as much of a treasure as anything we recovered from Albez. It’s far more useful than a bag of holding. And you want—”
“Yes. I want it.”
Erin didn’t say out loud that the Horns of Hammerad owed her, but they had promised, hadn’t they? They’d said a treasure, and she could think of nothing she would want more than this door. She saw Ceria exchange a glance with the others. Pisces was spluttering.
“You can’t just demand—this is far too sudden to—”
“Yes.”
Ceria nodded. She smiled at Erin, and looked at the door.
“For you, Erin? Yes, you can have this…door.”
Yvlon nodded as well.
“We wouldn’t have gotten anywhere if it weren’t for you. And you lent us your gold—twice, now. Of course you can have it.”
Ksmvr nodded as well.
“This seems to be an acceptable form of remuneration. Here is your teleportation stone.”
He handed it to Erin. She held it gingerly. Pisces kept spluttering.
“But—I just got—it was my discovery and—”
“And you did well. Thank you.”
Erin smiled widely at Pisces. He blinked at her and threw his hands up in exasperation.
“Fine. I am outnumbered and overruled by the imposition of what some might call honor or common decency. Take the damned door!”
“I will.”
The young woman patted the door.
“My door.”
Pisces sniffed, clearly upset. Ceria laughed, and slung an arm around his shoulder. He froze up for a second and stared at her. She seemed surprised by the action as well, and released him quickly.
“Cheer up. Erin made a lot of food—and lunch for you two since you missed it. Although I suppose it would be dinner, now.”
Instantly he brightened up.
“Ah, well, I suppose that—”
“—But you’ll have to eat it on the wagon. We’ve got to go now if we want to get to any sort of settlement by nightfall.”
Ceria dragged Pisces back as he headed towards the inn. He complained, but soon he was helping drag the door onto the back of the wagon. Erin turned to help push it further in, and stopped.
A group of people were standing behind her. Miss Agnes, Maran, Safry, Jasi, Grev, Wesle, the [Actors], a number of regular patrons from her inn, Octavia…they stood, smiling at her.
Slowly, Erin stepped towards them. She felt…quite empty inside, really. As if there weren’t any tears to cry. And there weren’t.
There was only a smile. She smiled at them, and went to each one, hugging and kissing Wesle on the cheek and Grev on a dirty forehead, talking and saying goodbye.
But not forever. And so the emptiness in her filled, and when the wagon started to move, Erin could shed a tear. But not a sad tear. She was just so full of memories and happiness that a bit came out anyways.
She sat on the wagon as it rolled out of the city. The Horns of Hammerad sat around her. Friends. Yvlon and Ceria talked animatedly about the play they’d been a part of, recounting the good bits to Ksmvr while Pisces devoured the packed lunch Erin had made for him and Ksmvr.
Erin sat back, and as the cold evening breeze blew past her face, she smiled. A bit sadly.
It was time to go. Celum was…a lovely place. But it wasn’t home. She had to go back to Liscor.
“Goodbye.”
She whispered it to the wind. Not sadly—in her heart she promised to return some day. There was more to this world besides Liscor. And some day she would explore it.
Some day. But for now she was going back. To Mrsha and Selys and even annoying Lyonette. She wanted to go back so desperately it hurt Erin’s chest. But she wouldn’t forget what she’d experienced here.
They rolled out of the city and Erin finally left Celum behind.
—-
It was a quiet wagon that slowly rode down the trampled road, slowly moving south. The wagon driver didn’t have a movement Skill, but he was used to the uncertain road and he was skilled and Skilled enough to detect danger. It would take a day – or two or even three – to get to Liscor, but they’d get there, and hopefully without running into any danger.
Erin sat next to the other Horns of Hammerad, not saying anything. At first she’d chatted, but the cold and wind had a way of silencing even the most spirited conversation. And she felt a bit selfish, but she wished—she wished she was back in the Frenzied Hare right now rather than moving around in the cold winter.